Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1887-10-18
STREET RAILWAY RACKET.
Interest In the Matter Still Very treat
what a Citizens Director Has to Say.

Interest In the Matter Still Very treat
What = Citizens Director Has to Say.
There is still a good deal of interest in
the recent attempt on the part of the rep
resentatives of the rival street railway
lines to effect a consolidation of their in
~terests, and the parties to the unsuccessful
negotiations are busy trying to set each
other right in the matter. Sunday the
Electrical people had their inning, and
Yesterday was the turn of the representa-
tives of the Citizens Company to get the
floor.
A Director in the Citizens Railway
Company made the following statement to
a reporter for the REGISTER:
'Tbe whole idea of e~ndeavoriDg to see
whether a consolidation of interests be
tween the Citizens and the Wheeling rail-
way companies could be made, mutually
satisfactory, arose from a conversation in
augurated by a gentleman now a Director
of the Electrical Railway Company and OF
his own seeking, with a Director Of the
Citizens Company. This occurred shortly
after the right to use electricity had been
granted by Council to the Citizens Com
pany. which, as every one knows, was sub
seuuent to the grant made to the Electrical
Company. This gentleman urged in that
interview that he was interested in the
Electric Light Power Company, and not In
the Railway Company; that he was not
speaking as a railroad man, but for
the Power Company; that the Citi-
zens' Company could obtain its cleo
trical power from the Power Company,
and that if it would buy its power from IT,
there would be no difficulty in getting rid
| of the Electrical railroad franchise. The
| Director of the Citizens Company insisted
that the projectors of the Electrical rail-
road thought they had something of great
value, and would want to be paid a good
sum for their franchise, etc, but this was
combatted. The gentleman was satisfied
that there would be no difficulty in getting
rid Of the competition, provided power was
taken by the Citizens Company from the
Light Company, which, he said, was about
to build its power house.
Subsequently, upon the organization oil
the Electrical Railway Company, the TACT
that this gentleman was elected one OF the
Directors, gave additional authority to his
previous utterances.
after a careful inspection of the merits
of the different electric motors, three gen
tlemen interested in the Citizens Com
pany thought it would be better 10 ascer'
tain whether any accommodation between
the two companies could be effected before
a final contract was entered into by the
Citizens Company for an electrical system
which would differ so greatly from that
already selected by 1.-The other COM
pany as to render it almost II
not utterly impossible for the twC
roads ever to be operated together should
future events show to those owning them
that such combined operation was desira'
BILE. Inasmuch as this Director of the
Electrical Railway Company had expressed
his sentiments so fully before the election
of the Directors of such Company, he was
approached by these three gentlemen, who
were not a committee, nor authorized as 8
committee, to take the action they did.
This is a full and entire answer to the pub
lished statement as to how the negotia-
tons were brought about.
1.-THE question might now be asked with
propriety: sWhy is it that the Power Com
pany has all at once come to the conclusion
that it doesn't desire customers? That il
don't want patronage? Why, we were
asked a bonus by the Electrical Railway
Company's Committee for the privilege Of
a contract for our power from a corpora
ton chartered and organized for the pur'
pose of selling electricity to all the world,
as we supposed.
"If the Electric Light and Power Com
pany and the Electrical Railway Company
are different corporations in name only,
then this may be satisfactorily explained